Set In Ink
by BuellerBueller
Summary: Sandy's in Florida, and she finally gets up the courage to write to Soda. "No. She couldn't say 'all my love'. It wasn't the truth, and it'd only play with Soda's feelings. She'd hurt him enough. She crossed it out, tried to make a little drawing out of it so he wouldn't suspect anything when he read it. If he read it."


She sighed, looking down at the paper on her desk, and picked up the pen again.

_Dear Sodapop,_ she began. No, too formal. She crumpled up the paper and tore another out of her notebook.

_Hey, Soda_. Maybe that was too causal. He probably hated her, at this point. She'd cheated on him, gotten pregnant, and ignored him for a good, _long_, while.

_Soda, I'm real sorry about your friends, Dallas and Johnny. I heard from Sylvia. She was real broken up about it. I can't imagine how you're feeling. I'm sorry I waited so long to write back. I couldn't. It was selfish, but hearing from you…it would've made this even harder for me. Maybe you don't wanna hear from me anymore. Maybe you didn't even read this. Maybe I'll be getting this back, unread, like you got your letters back from me so many times. I deserve it. But I do want you to know I'm sorry. I'm ashamed of myself that it took so much for me to write you. I'm ashamed that I'm using Dally and Johnny as an excuse to write to you. It's not right of me. Not at all. But it's not like I've been doing the right thing lately anyway. I want you to know how sorry I am. Really, I am. Cross my heart. I know it don't really seem that way. I haven't wrote to you at all, even when I knew you still loved me. Wonder if you still love me. I bet not, after all these months. Who am I kidding? You're Sodapop Curtis. You've got tons of girls just itching to date you. With that selection, I bet you found a nice girl that you like. It's very selfish of me to say, especially under the circumstances, but I hope y'all don't look at each other the same way we looked at each other. I know I cheated, but not once did I look at another guy the way I looked at you. But that don't count for anything, I guess. I still slept with them. I guess the way we looked at each other wasn't enough, huh? I don't know why. You were and you still would be more than enough, and I can say I've never regretted anything more than leaving you behind. So Soda, I'm just real sorry. For Dallas and Johnny. For Ponyboy running away. For cheating on you. For leaving. For ignoring you. Everything. I'm just sorry. _

_ All my love, _

No. She couldn't say 'all my love'. It wasn't the truth, and it'd only play with Soda's feelings. She'd hurt him enough. She crossed it out, tried to make a little drawing out of it so he wouldn't suspect anything when he read it. _If_ he read it.

So she just wrote: _Sandy_ with the same curly-q 'y' that she did on the little notes she and Soda passed in class, back when he was in school still.

Sandy padded down the stairs, which _didn't creak_, by the way. They were practically Socs, her grandparents. She tiptoed into the kitchen, and out the front door. The door didn't creak either. She would never get used to it. She slid the letter into the mailbox and told herself: _If he doesn't reply…I'm too late. But that's okay._

It wasn't okay, but she needed to pretend it was. It was only fair.

She slipped back into the pretty house, and up the nice, _carpeted _stairs, opened her bedroom door soundlessly, and sighed as she got into bed.

Sandy's grandmother was an early bird, as most grandmothers are. She was sharp. She heard Sandy last night, the little sneak. She'd watched from the window, and she knew Sandy certainly wasn't writing to Evie or Sylvia that time of night, or sneaking around to get it in the mailbox. No, it was that boy. The one who kept writing, over and _over again._

Outside, she breathed in the sweet, Spring, morning air, and sauntered across her manicured lawn –she might be getting up there, but she still had it, she _was_ Sandy's grandmother after all, and the girl had to get it from someone-, over to her nice white mailbox. No paint chips, no dents. Perfect. Well, _almost _perfect. She plucked the letter out of the mailbox, and ripped it in half. There. _Now _it was perfect.

It was for Sandy's own good anyway.

But miles and miles away, a Sodapop Curtis hopped out of his best friend's car, and yelled,

"HONEY, I'm home!"

"My dear Sodapop! Here at last! I been waitin' all day for you!" Two-Bit Mathews sang. From inside the humble house with the chipped paint and slightly overgrown lawn, someone told Soda to get the mail.

He jogged over to the rusty mailbox, and opened it with an awful creak. It made him cringe every single time. He flipped through the envelopes._ Mr. Darrel Curtis, Mr. Darrel Curtis, Mr…_

Sodapop Curtis!

It was for him! He had mail! Was it Sandy?

He was pretty much over her, he even had a cute little new broad. But his heart still flipped whenever he checked the mail, and it still sank when it wasn't her.

But maybe this was. It was mighty official looking though.

And when Sodapop Curtis opened that letter, his heart did indeed flip and sink, and his insides _did_ turn to mush, the whole deal.

Only it wasn't the good kind.


End file.
